Nepali Student comments
Scholarship Application criteria

Reports by UK PhD Students following twining programme are available under Research articles & reports

Introduction

Funding Higher Education and Capacity Building in Nepal are at the heart of the Glacier Trust’s work. Most development work in the Himalayas and Nepal is carried out by Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs). But because Nepal’s climate is changing so rapidly, The Trust’s main concern is how to bring understanding of climate change to the centre of development programmes. Climate change affects every aspect of development from health to agriculture, livestock and forestry. More intense rainfall will also have serious affect on slope stability. The Nepalese are the best people to develop capacity building initiatives to deal with the multiple problems of climate change. Interventions will be much more effective with better academic understanding of the problems and for this they need financial support for higher education programmes.

Faculty members at Tribhuvan University with representitives form Southampton University and The Glacier Trust

Up to date fieldwork data gathering practices and methods of data analysis is therefore crucial. Getting postgraduates into the field to learn how to do primary research and to see the problems and difficulties of implementing projects is fundamental to our objectives. We try to link these scholarships to our own projects because hands-on experience will enable students to design and implement solutions in future, whether for governmental or non governmental organisations. In this way we hope to strengthen and to develop the means by which adaptive skills can be shared between communities.

The Trust has set up links both with Kathmandu and Tribhuvan Universities, in association with the NGOs with which it is working (For example Helvitas, Eco Himal and Practical Action). Students are proposed by their supervisors and ultimately selected by NGOs, where a common area of interest can be established. Neither The Glacier Trust nor the NGOs seek to determine the students’ course of study, but careful discussion and selection will ensure that both the NGO and student benefits from the research undertaken.

hDs from Southampton Ellie Biggs and Gary Watmough twinned with Nepali postgrads Mohan Prasad Khatiwada and Parbati JoshiThe Glacier Trust is also open to applications for fieldwork grants from Himalayan postgraduate students in connection with climate change related research projects where the Trust is not directly connected. Research will normally be associated with governmental or non governmental projects.

The Trust also builds links between UK Universities and Nepali Universities, dramatically enhancing the value of the grants that we make. For example with the help of the GeoData Institute of Southampton University, we have set up a twinning programme between Southampton and Tribhuvan University, whereby PhD students from Southampton are assisting in curriculum development, teaching and working with Nepali postgraduates in the field. This twinning arrangement cut both ways and greatly benefit the Southampton students’ depth of research.